Gulf Cartel

The Gulf Cartel was a crime syndicate in Mexico that was founded during the 1930s by Juan Nepomuceno Guerra. Nepomuceno began bootlegging alcohol into the United States during Prohibition, but his nephew Juan Garcia Abrego began to traffick cocaine in the late 1970s. The Gulf Cartel used the same routes into America to become very rich, and the group eventually became an international network with dealings in Europe, West Africa, Asia, Central America, and South America in addition to Mexico and the US. The cartel was particularly violent during the drug wars of the 2000s, and it was known to intimidate the population, employing former Mexican Army mercenaries that would later become known as "Los Zetas"; Los Zetas would later take over much of the Gulf Cartel's territory and become a rival cartel.